<p>^^Yes, Jim Jones is another one they don’t know about.</p>
<p>Some article I read last week pointed out that folks under 20 have no clue what they’re clicking on when they select the icon for saving a file – the one that looks like a 3.5-inch floppy disk. It’s amazing how fast those vanished. They were an essential part of everyday life when I started law school in 1999 and the digital equivalent of a horse-drawn streetcar when I graduated in 2002.</p>
<p>“patience”</p>
<p>Hanna–we were cleaning out our storage closet and came across a file box that had some floppy disks from when I was in college, REAL floppy disks. They kids thought they were hilarious as they carry their flash drives around with their 32 g of memory or whatever they had. I remember having to use several floppy disks for ONE research paper…</p>
<p>I had a professor in college tell us that if we knew how to key punch that we would have a job for life. So much for that skill. I certainly don’t miss the old computer key punch cards. That was a nightmare. </p>
<p>At the school where I work, I often am telling kids to dial 9 to get an outside line. They never say anything but I always think don’t they wonder why I am telling them to dial a push button? I can never think of a better word.</p>
<p>What about kit and caboodle? Or my dad’s favorite- shank’s mare? If you don’t know that one, it means to use your legs.</p>
<p>This is a fun thread.</p>
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</p>
<p>I think most kids know what this means, although they may not know the origin.</p>
<p>“Sketchy” - to me it meant consisting of no more than a sketch, as in brief or not fully explained. To my kids it apparently means questionable or perhaps even dangerous.</p>
<p>On the other hand, my kids were shocked that I knew what some slang sexual terms meant…because they’ve been around for decades. They thought that those words were recently coined.</p>
<p>Peanut gallery…Let’s rap…Coolio…Do Bee…</p>
<p>In a few years, the concept of “clockwise” and “counterclockwise” will be meaningless. What will we say instead?</p>
<p>My kids will never know the smell of a freshly mimeographed quiz, laid over your nose while you tilted back your head before passing it back to the next kid in the row.</p>
<p>Nor will they know what a “mimeo” is, or that the ink on everything that was ever handed out was purple.</p>
<p>We had chicken for dinner tonight and I asked D if she wanted ’ the part that went over the fence last’–got a very blank look until I explained that it was the tail…</p>
<p>hayden,</p>
<p>I have already had to explain that one too often to my students.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t know him from Adam</p>
<p>This week in one of my classes we were talking about DJs at college parties when I was in college. I had to explain reel to reel tape. I drew it on the board with circles and dots in the middle for the pins (or whatever those things you put them on we’re called). When I looked at the board, I said, “Oh, that looks like boobs.” Then I had to fill in the reels.</p>
<p>“please” and “thank-you”</p>
<p>LOL</p>
<p>I did have to explain “Lard” to my son a few months ago, and showed him a cook book that talked about cooking with it!</p>
<p>Pretty much any time I quote an old commercial “Mikey will eat it, he’ll eat anything!” or “Tricks are for kids”.</p>
<p>This happened to me today when I said something to my son about “staying on the straight and narrow” and he had no idea what I was talking about.</p>
<p>
I loved that smell.</p>
<p>^^^ditto!!</p>
<p>I grew up in NJ but my parents were born and raised in S.Carolina. My mom used phrases all the time that I picked up on, and only later realized none of my northern friends knew what I was talking about. I’m not sure if it was regional, generational or both. If my mom wanted me home NOW I knew I’d better get home faster than Snyder’s bull. If something shrank in the wash, it drew up. And if we were considering doing something, “We might could do that.” When my aunt was trying to get my cousin to behave, Aunt threatened to knock Cousin into the middle of next week (bet that would get a call from Social Service now!)</p>
<p>The thing that got me a few years ago was when a lightning storm blew out our garage door openers. The kids had no idea you could open & close garage doors by hand, and they fought over whose turn it was to do it! That wore off pretty fast though…</p>
<p>My college age daughter has been very busy. I told her that sometimes we have to “catch as catch can.” She did not believe that to be a legitimate phrase until she looked it up. Now it is on her “word” of the day list!</p>